


the hour of great mercy

by tnevmucric



Category: Persona 5, Persona Series
Genre: M/M, they just want to be alone and in love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-22
Updated: 2018-09-22
Packaged: 2019-07-15 11:51:46
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,913
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16062545
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tnevmucric/pseuds/tnevmucric
Summary: i will allow you to enter in my mortal sorrow. in this hour, i will refuse nothing to the soul that makes a request





	the hour of great mercy

I am a ineloquent spitball of bad judgements. Nausea rose from the floorboards and travelled through my windpipe with every shallow breath I stole; it was as though the condensing feelings of both nothingness and overwhelm had coiled within my intestines with the same festering pace of parasites. My freedom, shackled elsewhere, hid between distant years passed and- dragged by its feet- left a bloody trail behind me: the tormenting, effulgent stalk of predator and prey. _L'enfer, c'est les autres._ Words that I could maybe taste if I leaned close enough lingered on his tongue. The unpromised: we have time. The sincere: this time is ours.  
  
He trails off. Steam stole whatever faux buoyancy he'd styled his hair to be that morning and revealed its natural frizz and curl. His knuckles looked very barely white as he gripped the side of the counter, the orange sky outside just nearly floating through the open wounds of the Yongen-Jaya and into the colour-stained window of Leblanć.  
  
His words, I think. His phrases. I crave them and binge them all at once- I need to make them my own, sculpt them in my own throat. He must somehow revive me from a decades worth of death and evergreen with melting snow and sea. I regard him as one may a tiny shard of glass: I let him get stuck in me.  
  
"You study too much", he jokes finally. "I'm sure you can miss one night of it. That, and your detective work. Have a break, stay a little longer."  
  
We both know the trains stop soon. My hand crawls for my bag but something magnetises it to my lap. I want to wearily tilt my head on the open cusp of my palm, breathing the warm lighting of this small space and soaking in its artifical glow. I want to ask why he has my phone bugged. I know the answer. I want to ask why he hasn't given back my tie from when I'd left it here last.  
  
"I'm missing a tie", I say, "It's blue."  
  
"It could be upstairs."  
  
"I've never been upstairs."  
  
"Yes, but we're talking about your tie", he diverts, wringing out a cloth to the side. "Maybe Mona took it for a walk."  
  
He is raw, bleeding meat. Soaking into the oak wood of the café and playing noughts and crosses with himself on a chipped saucer. He glances over his glasses and there is nothing else except his organic, almost unretainable embarrassment. I want a photographic memory, just now. Just for now.  
  
"Want me to check?", his lips twitch. Unease or something unsure. My wrist cracks as I wipe an eyelash from my undereye and yawn, rolling my shoulders. I slump my chin to my hand.  
  
"Keep it", is all I say. I notice a flash of blue from my phone and so does he. As if suddenly geared back into motion, he sweeps sugar from the counter into his hand and dispenses it into the bin, wiping the varnish down with a cloth and refilling my cup with ease. A heat climbs his neck, a cavalier surge of blood. I narrow my eyes tiredly. I glance at the cup. Who's fucking counting? My feet swing under the chair, something similar to carnations wafting by in a sweet scent as he organised the remainder of the days work.  
  
"Akira", I say finally. He pauses, the muscles in his back becoming taut. "Would it be an issue if I stayed the night?"  
  
With the slight turn of his head, I know his eyes catch my phone and his fingers slip around the clean ceramics a little as he puts them away. He turns back to me; a little more relaxed with his eyes wrinkled at the corners. He leans over the counter with his gaze turned down, taking my wrists in his hands with a loose, more-than-meaningless grip. He squeezes once.  
  
"No, of course not", he says quietly. "I'd really like that."  
  
In seconds and in matters of shared breathing, I forget we are children. I remember we are quietly alight, simultaneously on the edge of a bubble (far past the recommended boiling point).  
  
His room changes each time I see it, and I forget about the bag I always leave by the bar stools. I linger in the feeling of his soft fingers grasping mine as he trails us upstairs and I resign myself to the immediate comfort that the smell of dust and his cologne brings. My tie, I notice, is just where I'd left it: hanging off of the shelf.

He forces me to slow down and care about the things I haven't cared about before. He watches me stare at the room, taking everything in as if I hadn't seen it before. Secretly, I watch him fiddle with his fringe. Secretly, I make plans to look closer at the photo he has tucked underneath his lamp. For now, I send my gaze back to him. He radiates a kind of bittersweet.  
  
"Want to borrow my pyjamas?", he asks, turning away. He knows the answer and I shuffle forward, loosely dropping to the bed. A cacophony resides in my stomach as he throws the clothes down, settling on his knees in front of me and beginning to take my outfit off; precise and quiet, I cannot see his eyes past the reflective glare of his glasses. He tucks my shoes under the bed, folds my pants three times and pulls a comfortable pair of sweatpants over my thighs, thumbs lingering at my hips. I let my fingers tentatively crawl through his hair, the silence of this particular sunset setting an eerie, heavy feeling in my calves. Momentarily, he hides his face: nails tearing into the hem of my shirt and nose digging uncomfortably into my knee. My thumb brushes his ear and I wonder if he hears the ocean in there.  
  
He makes quick work of pulling a sweater over my head and placing my shirt on a coat hanger, but takes his time to button each section.  
  
"You know, I used to want to be a fairy."  
  
A smile shatters my expression. I can't control the sudden burst from my chest and his toothy grin blinds me; I feel my cheeks squish around my dimples. He pulls off his shirt in a smooth movement and folds it carelessly over his desk chair, toeing off his sneakers in the corner.  
  
"My", I start teasingly, "I suppose I should have guessed because of your attatchment to those tights Ann let you keep."  
  
He rolls his eyes and flicks the light off, easily nudging into bed beside me. "Tights are comfy and you love seeing me in them, let's not have this conversation. But yeah. My mom used to tell me all these stories about fairies who'd ask people for their names and everyone would be like, _'hey, my names john'_ when really you shouldn't _ever_ tell a fairy your name."

"Why not?"

He makes a considering noise and pulls me tighter to his chest. "Well, once it knows your name, it has complete power over you. I use to try but I never could pull off that sexy fairy look."

"Really?", I shift onto my side, slinging an arm and leg over him and forcing his arm to move around my back. "So if a devilishly handsome person was to ask for my name, I'm to say-?"  
  
"I'd give you my name", he cuts in. "Y'know, to protect you and all. Everyone knows your name. I'd give you my name."  
  
He breathes as if I'm dying, and maybe I am. He begs me closer with each inhale and his lungs quiver to his resisting bones: _let me take you in_ , he must be thinking. _We can't_ , his autonomic system must cry. No one can hear us here.  
  
"Why are you telling me this?", I ask quietly, jutting my chin out so my lips touch his neck. "You've got an agenda. You always do."  
  
But I have it wrong. He's scared.  
  
"I'm scared", he admits, but it's void of fear. "I wish we'd never found out about Kamoshida, you know. I wish we didn't fuck around with Madarame", his breaths suddenly come out harshly and his eyes blink desperately in my hair. "Let's not go to Sae's palace. I'll help Sojiro all day and serve you coffee until it's night again. Doesn't that sound nice? Tell me it sounds nice, Goro, I-"  
  
"Please calm down."  
  
"I trust you", he holds onto me. Fast, bruising and with a last-drop-of-water kind of desperation. I want him to swallow me whole, because at least then he'd know how I feel.  
  
Trust creates that Hell in people. A once prospective idea distorts into anti-appeal: something like foul-smelling odors and spilt drinks. If they're listening, I glance at his laptop, do they pity him? Is their leader weak, now? Or stronger?  
  
"Press your hand on my chest", the windows rattle as the onset rain finally reaches the streets of Tokyo. "Just- I want you to listen to it. Just try and listen."

Everything changes so... quickly, with him. Unpredictability is our highlighted trait no matter how entwined our fates seem. He shakes against my ribcage. Tears clump his eyelashes together and his nose squishes in the very slight concave of my sternum.

"I'm okay", he chokes out. "I'm fine." I tilt my head down and press our cheeks together. A hiccup gets lodged in his throat. "Sorry, it just- it happens sometimes. Sorry."

"You're okay." Truer words have been spoken. "You're alive."

"I'm so scared."

"So am I", I admit hesitantly. "People don't want their lives fixed or their messes cleaned up. All it would leave is the great unknown: something they don't want to face. I don't know what's going to happen, truly. No matter how hard we try."

"You're so calm about this."

"I suppose your presence helps."

Akira lets out a little amused breath into my neck and I find myself wincing as he pulls away. His cheeks are a light pink and he looks significantly more tired than when I'd arrived at Leblanc. A sad smile slants his lips.

"You're sweet." I swipe my thumb over the dark bruises that create his under-eye and avoid looking at him directly.

"You haven't been sleeping."

"I sleep better when you're around."

I laugh quietly, moving to comb my fingers through his fringe.

"If Morgana heard that, he'd have my head _and_ yours."

"Morgana isn't here, though."

I can't help but laugh again and watch him glimmer with quiet praise. He looks at me with something fulfilling, something that I couldn't place in a gallery or a photo album. Something like bulletproof glass.

"What are you thinking?", he asks me quietly. And I'm sad. I'm an obtrusive desolation hidden between woven folds of desperation and media-exclusive magazines. I want to waste my time with him, whatever amount of it I have left. I kiss him with the intent of never letting him kiss back.

I'm going to take his breath away.

"Goro", he gasps. "Goro."

It's selfish of me to believe that fate made his body sculpted to me, but his shoulders fall so perfectly backwards and the scoop of his lower back bends so gently into my palms. He chases my tongue. He chases.

"Goro", he whines.

Just tonight, I think desperately. I can give him this tonight.

Even if it kills him.


End file.
